Many different businesses use newsletters as a means of communicating with their customers. Newsletters may be periodic in nature, for example monthly or quarterly, or released upon the occurrence of a particular event of interest. Such newsletters provide businesses with an opportunity to stay in touch with, market to and provide current and useful information to existing customers.
In fact, it has been estimated that in the calendar year 2005, U.S. businesses will spend approximately $7.3 billion (U.S.) on the generation and distribution of electronic newsletters.
Many different processes exist for the creation and distribution of newsletters. Traditionally newsletters were created by hand, for example through typing, reproduced using presses or other electro-mechanical reproduction equipment and mailed by postal service to recipients. More recently, computers are being used extensively in the creation of newsletters. For example, U.S. Pat. No. 6,026,417 to Ross et al. shows a desktop publishing system that enables a user to change the format of a publication without re-entering content information. U.S. Pat. No. 6,356,903 B1 to Baxter et al. shows systems and methods for organizing and presenting content from a variety of sources in a unified format.
In addition to the use of computers to create newsletters, alternative electronic methods of distribution have become available for the transmission of newsletters. Newsletters today may be distributed electronically, through private networks and/or through public networks such as the Internet. Electronically distributed newsletters may be communicated in a variety of ways, for example by posting for readers to view or by electronic mailing to recipient electronic mail (email) addresses. See, for example, published U.S. patent application 2003/00886334/A1 to Friedman showing methods and systems for generating and distributing electronic newsletters and ezines based upon viewer interest. Other methods of distribution include facsimile machines and portable electronic equipment such as portable digital assistants (PDAs) and even mobile telephones.
Despite advances afforded through the use of computers, the assembly and distribution of newsletters and similar content communications between businesses and customers still presents a process ripe with challenges. Initially, there is the challenge of collecting content of interest. Content collection is expensive and time-consuming. Following the collection of content, there is the challenge of selecting and assembling content of interest for particular recipients. Different customer sets likely have different interests. Even after content is identified and assembled, transmitting the newsletter to customers requires the assembly and ongoing maintenance of customer distribution information, for example mailing addresses, email addresses, facsimile telephone numbers and other customer contact information.
There thus exists the need for methods and systems that facilitate the creation and distribution of content, for example of newsletters by businesses for distribution to customers. Such methods and systems would desirably facilitate and simplify the process of content creation, content assembly and distribution to recipients.